Leap Attack fix.

[Kizara]

Tired of every martial build being 1) ToB 2) lockdown or 3) ubercharger?

Well, I have a partial fix for #3. Leap attack is crazy good, and a basic must-have for a charger build.

Now, one could just ban it, but that knocks the wind out of said charger's sails a bit much.

So, my fix:

-Leap Attack: As part of a charge, make a DC 15 Jump check to spend 10 feat of your movement in the air. If you are only moving 10 feet total in your charge, increase the Jump DC to 20. The initial strike of your charge gains a total of +3 to hit and you deal an amount of additional damage equal to your strength modifier. However, you suffer a -4 penalty to AC. These effects replace the normal benefits and drawbacks from charging.


Still good, I know I'd take it with my barbarian. But no more crazy stacking with PA, and less synergy with ST.


As an aside, I don't really like ST ethier. Headless charge is probably mildly overpowered, but in general the flavor of the feat doesn't match up well. All the bull-rushing effects... and then headless charge.

[Vael Nir]

Leap Attack and Shock Trooper are only imbalanced with 1-level pounce dips, (maybe) dire charge at epic levels, and especially things like favored power attack and supreme power attack... adding too many multipliers breaks anything.

Take as an example my level 20... I'll just call him a fighter. BAB of 20, so can power attack for that amount. AC of 34, not especially tank-built, but can pump it up with imp combat expertise when needed. Sooo... what can I do to that 400hp+ monster?

Charge, heedless charge + PA 20... so I do 2d6 + 5 (weapon) + 20 (strength modifier) + 60 (20x3, power attack with 2h + leap attack) = 97 damage non-critical. With a great sword, you *could* crit for 194 damage... the problem here being that any monster I've faced in this category has been immune to crits or had a greater iron guard/iron body buff active.

So, I charged, did 97 damage, oh... now I have... ac 14. Great. I'm right next to the bigass dragon or whatever that probably has a ton of attacks to send my way on its turn. Even if I have elusive target, I'm screwed... its insane stats will add a bunch of strength bonus to any attack it has. touch spells? oh yeah, they'll hit for sure. I'd have to be *stupid* to use the "CHAAARGE" approach.

Some groups don't *allow* 1 level dips in brokenness.

[Starbuck_II]

Charge, heedless charge + PA 20... so I do 2d6 + 5 (weapon) + 20 (strength modifier) + 60 (20x3, power attack with 2h + leap attack) = 97 damage non-critical. With a great sword, you *could* crit for 194 damage... the problem here being that any monster I've faced in this category has been immune to crits or had a greater iron guard/iron body buff active.



Leap attack is not a multiplier.
The errata says so.

If you deal 2x with 2 handed adding 100% is 2 is another 2. Thus 4 x with Leap attack. The rest are multipliers though.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

So in other words, that fourth most powerful Fighter build not counting ToB is just too god Darned powerful?

Seriously, I'm pretty sure you are the only person looking to nerf Fighters who already can't do anything.

[Reinboom]

You forgot to add in the 5% chance of autokill by massive damage there! :smalltongue:


So in other words, that fourth most powerful Fighter build not counting ToB is just too god Darned powerful?

Seriously, I'm pretty sure you are the only person looking to nerf Fighters who already can't do anything.

I think this is slightly off, and a bad representation of what this forum puts out (or this forum puts out a bad representation - which is probably more true). Classes are not one entities, they are a collection of 20 levels, each providing it's own level of power. When misrepresenting them as one entity, and doing math focused upon that of only specific levels, it causes misconceptions of what actually occurs mid game. The fighter, as a whole, is underpowered. However, when looking at just, say, a level 4 fighter - I can make it quite overpowered for the level.

Nerfing would be horrible for the poor level 20 fighters, or the level 10 fighters even. I've had an ubercharger make things too simple for a level 6 party, as in, one shot common too simple.

For the fix itself:
I like it, though, I would rather just ban it anyways or stuff it in to a fluff feat option, for much the same reasons of "meh, nobody bullrushes or overruns, anyways - why add more possible complications."

[olelia]

Leap Attack and Shock Trooper are only imbalanced with 1-level pounce dips, (maybe) dire charge at epic levels, and especially things like favored power attack and supreme power attack... adding too many multipliers breaks anything.

Take as an example my level 20... I'll just call him a fighter. BAB of 20, so can power attack for that amount. AC of 34, not especially tank-built, but can pump it up with imp combat expertise when needed. Sooo... what can I do to that 400hp+ monster?

Charge, heedless charge + PA 20... so I do 2d6 + 5 (weapon) + 20 (strength modifier) + 60 (20x3, power attack with 2h + leap attack) = 97 damage non-critical. With a great sword, you *could* crit for 194 damage... the problem here being that any monster I've faced in this category has been immune to crits or had a greater iron guard/iron body buff active.

So, I charged, did 97 damage, oh... now I have... ac 14. Great. I'm right next to the bigass dragon or whatever that probably has a ton of attacks to send my way on its turn. Even if I have elusive target, I'm screwed... its insane stats will add a bunch of strength bonus to any attack it has. touch spells? oh yeah, they'll hit for sure. I'd have to be *stupid* to use the "CHAAARGE" approach.

Some groups don't *allow* 1 level dips in brokenness.

Your two handing the greatsword so +40 from PA. And...it will have to make a massive damage save which it auto succeds except on a one. So with the correct math. 160 (leap attack + PA) + 20 (STR) + 5
So 185 + 2d6...and that is without actually attempting to cheese it.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

You forgot to add in the 5% chance of autokill by massive damage there! :smalltongue:



I think this is slightly off, and a bad representation of what this forum puts out (or this forum puts out a bad representation - which is probably more true). Classes are not one entities, they are a collection of 20 levels, each providing it's own level of power. When misrepresenting them as one entity, and doing math focused upon that of only specific levels, it causes misconceptions of what actually occurs mid game. The fighter, as a whole, is underpowered. However, when looking at just, say, a level 4 fighter - I can make it quite overpowered for the level.

Nerfing would be horrible for the poor level 20 fighters, or the level 10 fighters even. I've had an ubercharger make things too simple for a level 6 party, as in, one shot common too simple.

For the fix itself:
I like it, though, I would rather just ban it anyways or stuff it in to a fluff feat option, for much the same reasons of "meh, nobody bullrushes or overruns, anyways - why add more possible complications."


So in other words:

Evil Uberchargers don't even come up until level 5-6, then they are "too powerful" (IE less powerful then Wizards) until about level 8, then from 9-20 they suck because they can't play the high level game is just a game of "Please Mister Wizard/Cleric handicap the enemy and buff me so that I can get my charge in at round three."

Yeah, for some reason I'm not so worried about the balance considerations of an ubercharger.

Bullrusher is good from 2-10. Archer can at least contribute meaningfully at every level without a Wizard setting him up. And a Lockdown/Tripper-Standstill type is good from level one, and can still help out at levels 10-20.

For some reason I'm not worried about evil Uberchargers unbalancing my game.

[Vael Nir]

Leap attack is not a multiplier.
The errata says so.

If you deal 2x with 2 handed adding 100% is 2 is another 2. Thus 4 x with Leap attack. The rest are multipliers though.

Seriously? Ok, disregard what I said. :smalleek:

[Reinboom]

So in other words:

Evil Uberchargers don't even come up until level 5-6, then they are "too powerful" (IE less powerful then Wizards) until about level 8, then from 9-20 they suck because they can't play the high level game is just a game of "Please Mister Wizard/Cleric handicap the enemy and buff me so that I can get my charge in at round three."

Yeah, for some reason I'm not so worried about the balance considerations of an ubercharger.

Bullrusher is good from 2-10. Archer can at least contribute meaningfully at every level without a Wizard setting him up. And a Lockdown/Tripper-Standstill type is good from level one, and can still help out at levels 10-20.

For some reason I'm not worried about evil Uberchargers unbalancing my game.

Your attempted sarcasm is assuming a few things about my games, without knowing that I also ban wizards, clerics, druids, archivists, artificers, etc. etc. etc...

Also, each and every level is important, except 1-3 (dislike playing these levels), to me. Uberchargers may not be as overpowered in comparison to a lot of things - but - even skirting that threshold for 1 or 2 levels is enough for me to axe a piece of them. (In this case, I axe Leap Attack).

The game should not be a system of "X should be more powerful than Y during A-B because Y is way more powerful than X during C-D".

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Your attempted sarcasm is assuming a few things about my games, without knowing that I also ban wizards, clerics, druids, archivists, artificers, etc. etc. etc...

No, my Sarcasm assumes something about D&D, because that's what I was talking about. I specifically entered this discussion to say that it seems off of Kizara to propose "solutions" to problems that don't effect 90% of the forum, because most people here don't take the Core classes, sort them by power level, and then Nerf everything until they get to Monk.

I never assumed anything about you games where you ban half the game. I assumed that when you said:
I think this is slightly off, and a bad representation of what this forum puts out (or this forum puts out a bad representation - which is probably more true). Classes are not one entities, they are a collection of 20 levels, each providing it's own level of power. When misrepresenting them as one entity, and doing math focused upon that of only specific levels, it causes misconceptions of what actually occurs mid game. The fighter, as a whole, is underpowered. However, when looking at just, say, a level 4 fighter - I can make it quite overpowered for the level.

I didn't see that you included in invisible white text: "In my games because that's the only thing that matters."

If you are going to talk about things being a poor representation of D&D, you can't assume that your heavily nerfed games are the basis for comparison.


Also, each and every level is important, except 1-3 (dislike playing these levels), to me. Uberchargers may not be as overpowered in comparison to a lot of things - but - even skirting that threshold for 1 or 2 levels is enough for me to axe a piece of them. (In this case, I axe Leap Attack).

1) Every level is important except the ones you don't like? (I don't like those levels much either, but I can just as easily argue that nothing matters except 20 because that's the only level I like, and it would have just as much weight as you discounting levels 1-3.)

2) Uberchargers skirt overpowered for 3 levels, are decent for about 6, and suck horribly for 11. Unless you never play those eleven, you nerfing the skirting is also making them suck even more then they sucked before during the next 11. That's not fair either.


The game should not be a system of "X should be more powerful than Y during A-B because Y is way more powerful than X during C-D".

No it shouldn't. And it isn't. It's called Wizard's are more powerful all the damn time, but occasionally you want a Druid or Cleric for certain buffs and to tank for you.

Which is precisely the reason I object to nerfing a class that isn't very effective to begin with. Nerfing the useless class because it's actually useful for a few levels, and in return making them suck more at every single level, isn't somehow better.

[Da King]

I'm a bit confused here. According to Leap Attack (http://realmshelps.dandello.net/cgi-bin/feats.pl?Leap_Attack,CAd) The damage dealt by a power attack is tripled. So, the base +40 (two-handed weapon) with the x3 (2 handed) does 120 damage just from the power attack, correct? Or does it work so that Leap attack makes the power attack with a two handed weapon do x3 instead of x2, dealing 60 damage from the power attack?

[Starbuck_II]

I'm a bit confused here. According to Leap Attack (http://realmshelps.dandello.net/cgi-bin/feats.pl?Leap_Attack,CAd) The damage dealt by a power attack is tripled. So, the base +40 (two-handed weapon) with the x3 (2 handed) does 120 damage just from the power attack, correct? Or does it work so that Leap attack makes the power attack with a two handed weapon do x3 instead of x2, dealing 60 damage from the power attack?

They errataed Leap Attack: it is now a flat 100%.

So one handed is double what every you power attack. So PA for 2: you get 2 +2: so you get 4.
2 handed: Pa for 4, you get 8 +8=so you get 16.

[Frosty]

1) DnD multiplication doesn't work like that. Normally x3 x2 = x4. x6 x2 = x7. x4 x3 = x6. x4 x2 x2 = x6. The multiplier is a bonus based on the BASE value.

2) Leap Attack was ERRATA'ED to not say 3x anymore. It just says, +100% of normal PA bonus. This is a special case in which multiplication works normally, and so the normal PA bonus of +2 damage for a 2-hander is now up to +4 damage for a 2-hander per attack penalty.

[Da King]

So a Power Attack+Leap Attack with a Two-handed weapon at a -20 penalty deals an extra 80 points of damage then.

[Frosty]

So a Power Attack+Leap Attack with a Two-handed weapon at a -20 penalty deals an extra 80 points of damage then.

That is correct. Each attack made until the beginning of your next turn, including AoOs, deal an extra 80 points of damage, if you can hit anything.

[TempusCCK]

If you're taking this away from fighters, then you better be taking a hell of alot away from wizards, or banning them completely.

(As an aside, I've thought about just buying a version of the players handbook and going through the spells and changing durations and effects to what I think would be more balanced)

[Darrin]

They errataed Leap Attack: it is now a flat 100%.

I understand the errata. What I don't understand is... *WHY*?

You already have an established method of how to calculate multiple damage multipliers. Why would you toss all that out the window with a new special-case exception that can only create confusion and lead to rules headaches?

[Eldariel]

Probably because Leap Attack favoured one-handed PA since the multiplier was the same, but with the base being effect, the net effect was very much higher, especially with Two-Weapon Pounce or such. Basically, they want Two-Handed Fighting to be the best way to Power Attack, so they made Leap Attack synergize better with it.

[Kizara]

*sigh*

Everything degerates to "ZOMG WIZARDS WIN!!" (expressed better, but that's the sentiment).

For the record, I have about 12 typed pages of spell changes I've made. The issue SHOULDN'T be "well clerics/wizards own, so attempting to balance martial options is meaningless" as it is a seperate problem that I have dealt with extensively in a seperate way.

I can't believe that having a direct force multiplier, that essentially breaks all precedent of additive multipliers instead of exponential, seems more balanced to people then what I'm suggesting.

As for nerfing fighters, if you want to look at it, I've also made these changes to fighters and feat options in the game:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=78162

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=78636

Honestly, I don't want to get into a big digression/plug for my Tome of House Rules every fricken thread I make, but it seems people can't take a suggestion on it's own merits, and just say "well wizards are imba" and disregard you.

Oh, and for the record, Leap attack can easily be taken by a cleric or druid, and is quite useful for many druid forms (fleshraker, dire lion, etc), or wizards/gishes, especially those that abuse polymorph. It's not "just for fighters" if the feat had a "Fighter level 8" prereq on it you would have a point, but it doesn't and flavor-wise that would make no sense.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

For the record, I have about 12 typed pages of spell changes I've made. The issue SHOULDN'T be "well clerics/wizards own, so attempting to balance martial options is meaningless" as it is a seperate problem that I have dealt with extensively in a seperate way.

Right, and none of that matters when you start a thread advertising a fix for other people's games.

You can't advocate a fix for other people (what you did in this thread) unless it actually helps other people.

[Yakk]

The point is a good one.

Ubercharger breaks D&D even without Wizards breaking D&D.

How does it break D&D?
1> It is a one-trick pony that you will want to do as often as you can.

2> It frontloads damage in a fight

3> It generates so much damage that it makes entire alternative damage builds obsolete, even without pounce

With stuff like ubercharger in game, you are forced to up the HP of monsters, which renders non-ubercharger damage nearly useless. And then you add an entire tactical "avoid being charged" tactical metagame to the D&D combat game.

Sure, sometimes you can make builds that reach near ubercharger levels of damage -- but they are usually equally exploitive of narrow areas of the rules (twinned, split, empowered, energy substituted arcane thesis rays! (yes, I know that isn't perfectly optimal))

[Reinboom]

1) Every level is important except the ones you don't like? (I don't like those levels much either, but I can just as easily argue that nothing matters except 20 because that's the only level I like, and it would have just as much weight as you discounting levels 1-3.)

2) Uberchargers skirt overpowered for 3 levels, are decent for about 6, and suck horribly for 11. Unless you never play those eleven, you nerfing the skirting is also making them suck even more then they sucked before during the next 11. That's not fair either.

You mistook what I said to try to change the target of, well, some sort of blame. I specifically said I didn't like levels 1-3, and discounted them because I don't like them. As in, I don't try to balance them, I don't understand the power issues inherent there if there are any, etc. I can not contribute to a topic about them at all. Every level is important, EVERY level. I'm just not suited to work with the first 3 and thus have done little to modify and fix them - this is specifically why the "to me" is there.

I also said "even skirting is enough", not that it skirts, just that if it was only skirting I would axe it.
I've had it played in a campaign, I have seen it more than just "skirt". Giving this was a campaign before I started banning each other thing, the ubercharger was making both the ClericZilla and the Druid BOTH feel useless during it. Of course, this was only levels 5-7, at 7 is when I axed it, finally.

Further, the point of the comparison shouldn't be "This is D&D! The omniscificer, the billiond6 hulking hurler, and the hivemind all exist, so everything should just be that!", or even a simple "Everything should just be a wizard". Kizara asked for balance, not a mirrored comparison to the imbalanced portions of D&D.
There is a HUGE gap between "is this balanced?" and "is this batman?", and I think you mistook the question.


Right, and none of that matters when you start a thread advertising a fix for other people's games.

You can't advocate a fix for other people (what you did in this thread) unless it actually helps other people.

The way you have argued for this, I take it in order to present a decent fix for anything, someone first has to declare -everything- they have attempted to fix.
Since, in order to fix something to be balanced based on these standards, your going to have to fix D&D. Good luck. I highly suggest you do not recommend such.

This is a viable fix, to further balance Leap Attack, given 'balance' to meaning:

1. a state of equilibrium or equipoise; equal distribution of weight, amount, etc.
2. something used to produce equilibrium; counterpoise.
While nowhere in a thesaurus do I ever see it share an entry with 'crème de la crème'.


No it shouldn't. And it isn't. It's called Wizard's are more powerful all the damn time, but occasionally you want a Druid or Cleric for certain buffs and to tank for you.

Once again, the wizard/druid/cleric/etc. doesn't really matter in a thread pertaining to balance for anything more than showing the upper limits. You also did not get the point of my declaration on the XYABCD example. The idea is nothing should be so ridiculously overpowered, even for a few levels.
And this statement does apply to the masses, since I assume that there's at least one person who tries to play and claims to enjoy each base level in its own right, each level, separately. (defining 'base' level here as pre-epic. Since levels are infinite, it would be a losing declaration to say someone has played them all - even though epic is played and enjoyed by a few as well).

If you attempt to look at the game as a whole, with a statement "Why change it for being overpowered, when that will only make it weaker in the later levels when it doesn't matter as much?!"
Then you can also produce statements such as
"I highly don't recommend you remove natural spell from the druids, since they shouldn't be nerfed any further in comparison to when the wizards gain Gate."


Nerf everything until they get to Monk.

Side note: I also restrict players from taking the monk, and I frown on my players taking fighter for anything more than 2 levels. Both classes are way too underpowered for my tastes.

[Vortling]

Tired of every martial build being 1) ToB 2) lockdown or 3) ubercharger?


1)Nope, not in the slightest
2)*shrugs*
3)*shrugs*

What point of balance is your end goal here? I think the big reason you get people say the bit about wizards winning is you never indicate what your standard of balance is. In short, you say leap attack is overpowered but what are you comparing it to to reach that conclusion?

It also could be that you're heaping derision on an excellent supplement that has done nothing to earn your ire. Your scorn is confusing to me.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Kizara asked for balance, not a mirrored comparison to the imbalanced portions of D&D.
There is a HUGE gap between "is this balanced?" and "is this batman?", and I think you mistook the question.

I think that you made the mistake of assuming that balance can't be based on Batman.

Different people use different standards for balance, for Kizara it's the Monk, for me it's a well optimized Wizard/Druid/Cleric using the completes and the spell compendium. For Frank Trollman it's a straight Wizard 20 Core Transmuter. For TLN it's: I don't know. But everyone has a different standard. You accept that the Monk is just too weak for really being played, I accept that so is an unoptimized or Core anything.

Your standards for balance aren't inherently any better then mine.


If you attempt to look at the game as a whole, with a statement "Why change it for being overpowered, when that will only make it weaker in the later levels when it doesn't matter as much?!"
Then you can also produce statements such as
"I highly don't recommend you remove natural spell from the druids, since they shouldn't be nerfed any further in comparison to when the wizards gain Gate."

1) There is a big difference between being fairly useful for a few levels, and meh for the other 15, and being awesome for 15 levels, but never being gamebreaking.

2) You should never nerf Natural spell in any game with Wizards and Clerics.

[Reinboom]

I think that you made the mistake of assuming that balance can't be based on Batman.

Different people use different standards for balance, for Kizara it's the Monk, for me it's a well optimized Wizard/Druid/Cleric using the completes and the spell compendium. For Frank Trollman it's a straight Wizard 20 Core Transmuter. For TLN it's: I don't know. But everyone has a different standard. You accept that the Monk is just too weak for really being played, I accept that so is an unoptimized or Core anything.

Your standards for balance aren't inherently any better then mine.

Then you shouldn't try to read in a thread that obviously wasn't meant for your idea of balance, claiming that it is completely false because your idea of balance is different.
This conversation has degraded to what is one of the few reasons (http://xkcd.com/386/) this part of the forums is a pit of almost-flaming.

One liner statements that are attempting to stroke your own ego by making a claim that you find is wise personally and to try to put down the other poster. Of course my standards of balance aren't inherently better than yours, but it is a far wider consensus that the wizard or whatever is overpowered. Just because you happen to disagree doesn't contribute ANYTHING. So please don't try to bring down other topics just because they go against your style. It's a useless act.
This topic is OBVIOUS that it is for people who find Leap Attack overpowered. Your contribution otherwise hasn't added anything, other than putting a couple extra kbs in the SQL entries of the server.




Kizara, do you allow Lion Totem Barbarian? If no, I would suggest increasing the hit to +4. It makes it more consistent, and makes the setup the feat requires feel a little more worth it.

[Jasdoif]

Are you lowering the prereqs? I can see this change being helpful for beginning characters (whose Strength bonus is likely to be higher then their BAB), and continuing to be of use to them as time goes on and their Strength bonus goes up.

Although, why the extra +1 to the attack roll and the extra -2 to AC?

[Kizara]

Are you lowering the prereqs? I can see this change being helpful for beginning characters (whose Strength bonus is likely to be higher then their BAB), and continuing to be of use to them as time goes on and their Strength bonus goes up.

Although, why the extra +1 to the attack roll and the extra -2 to AC?

I hardly think Power Attack and Jump 8 ranks are unreasonable pre-reqs, as any melee heavy hitter is going to want PA anyways and Jump is pretty inplicit to the flavor. I think 6th level is plenty early for picking this feat up.

Barbarians will get the most use out of this feat, although other melee characters wanting another source of damage will also find it useful.

Seriously, lvl 6 human barb with bull's strength under rage has (18+4+4)26 strength, having this grant +8 damage. And it only scales up with level or non-human strength scores. Cleric with Divine Power/Righteous Might has (16+6+8) 30 strength, giving him a +10 damage bonus.

Honestly, its on par with Divine Might and a pretty solid choice IMO.

As for the charge changes, that's to represent the more powerful but reckless version of charge that the character is taking.

Rein: The main benefit of the feat is meant to be the damage, not the to-hit, but I see where you are comming from and will consider changing it. Thank you for your constructive input into the thread.

And no, I don't allow the pounce variant or anything from complete champion for that matter (book is made of cheese IMO). And I really like champion-style characters, often playing clerics or pallys.

Vecna: For the record, my balance standard is just above the rogue. Although I can enjoy more high-powered and silly games. Honestly, if you want a good idea of where I see the core classes please see the link I provided early, it neatly details my work and thus indirectly my views on such.

[TempusCCK]

I think the problem here has been hit on the head before.

Enemy HP scales at a much higher rate than damage scales for a melee based character PA and Leap Attack help fix this issue. Because without them you are stuck being ineffectual at best against high level encounters, you need to rely more and more on the versatility magic can offer to help overcome different monsters.

This isn't such a big deal with humanoid enemies, because HP is pretty much level based for them, but for the crazier things like Dragons and such, it's pretty killer.

[Jasdoif]

I hardly think Power Attack and Jump 8 ranks are unreasonable pre-reqs, as any melee heavy hitter is going to want PA anyways and Jump is pretty inplicit to the flavor. I think 6th level is plenty early for picking this feat up.Just thought I'd ask, I was thinking maybe a level 3 character would be happy with this as well.


Seriously, lvl 6 human barb with bull's strength under rage has (18+4+4)26 strength, having this grant +8 damage. And it only scales up with level or non-human strength scores. Cleric with Divine Power/Righteous Might has (16+6+8) 30 strength, giving him a +10 damage bonus.In the interests of valid comparisons, realize that the Cleric's starting +3 modifier on strength isn't part of the bonus he gets from the spells. So the two spells are only providing a +7 bonus, which I think actually improves the case you're making.


And no, I don't allow the pounce variant or anything from complete champion for that matter (book is made of cheese IMO). And I really like champion-style characters, often playing clerics or pallys.SweetRein might also be referring to the Lion Totem Barbarian variant in Unearthed Arcana, which at 5th level gets a +2 bonus to damage rolls whenever it charges. I was recently informed that the variant in Complete Champion is called the Spirit Lion Totem Barbarian (learn something new everyday when threads discuss things from books you don't have!)

[Yakk]

Naive character build:

Level 1 character, 16 strength, greatsword: 11 damage per hit on average.

Level 3 character, 18 strength, greatsword+1: 14 damage per hit on average

Level 11 character, 22 strength, greatsword+3, Holy, Spec: 28 damage per hit, 3 swings.

Level 20 character, 30 strength, greatsword+5 +5d6 special, Specx2: 48.5 damage per hit, 4 swings

CR 3 dragon: 30 HP, AC 15
CR 11 dragon: 199 HP, AC 27
CR 20 dragon: 459 HP, AC 39

PC to-hit grows with (Stat Bonus)+(Enchantment Bonus)+(~3/4 level) (this considers the Rogue to be the baseline -- the extra +5 from full BaB is an extra bonus). Some extra to-hit can be gained at various levels -- I'll use that as a measure of average to-hit, and presume those with more attacks can pull off a tad more to-hit.

It starts at about +3, and ends up at about +30. Call it level*1.5 + 1.5.

Using that standard:
CR 3 dragon: 30 HP @ 12+ on d20 (6.3 per round, 4.76 rounds to kill)
CR 11 dragon: 199 HP @ 9+ on d20 (50.4 per round, 3.95 rounds to kill)
CR 20 dragon: 459 HP @ 9+ on d20 (116.4 per round, 3.94 rounds to kill)

So using this very naive optimization attempt, I'm getting "it takes about 4 full attacks for a naively optimized fighter to full-attack kill an even-CR dragon".

This is true at level 3, level 11, and at level 20.

Remember: Dragons are often considered under-CR'd creatures.

(I used the Black dragon because it was the first one I ran into).

Using the same kind of rules:
30 stat in casting stat, 9th level spell -> DC for spells is 29.
The dragon has saves of: +26 +19 +23

Reflex was, traditionally, a damage-only spell line.
Fort: 3+ (90%)
Reflex: 10+ (55%)
Will: 6+ (75%)

It also has SR of 26, which naively blocks 25% of incoming spells.

7.5% of Fort saves are failed, 19% of will saves, 34% of reflex saves.

Traditionally, Reflex and Touch spells did damage. Fort and Will saves failure means "you are dead".

Let's assume that naive Wizard damage was in line with naive Fighter damage.

It would take 5 rounds on average for a Wizard to pound past the Will save of the dragon, or 13 rounds to pound past the Fortitude save, on average.

That's not that out of kilter either.

The idea that fights shouldn't be single-hit killfests, that healing in combat isn't stupid (because killing the target is so much easier), and that the wide variety of options shouldn't suck is a good one.

[Frosty]

Does your math take into account the iterative strike penalties? That last hit at -15 probably isn't going to hit the dragon at all, and the third hit is going ot miss most of the time.

And hell, you want to stand in front of the dragon and trade attacks with it? Are you insane? That dragon, even if it doesn't use any of its smart tactics, should rip apart most characters in direct melee.

As for casters, they're not supposed to use spells that allow saves. They'll probably want to take advantage of the low touch AC, however, and throw Orb spells, which don't allow saves for the damage, and bypass SR. At level 20, 10 of those orbs (if not metamagicked) will do the trick.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Now calculate how many full attacks it takes for a Dragon to kill a Fighter at Cr 11/20. The answer is probably about 1.

And that's not counting the fact that if the Dragon is even remotely intelligent that Fighter is never going to get a Full Attack:

Dragon: Breathes fire on group.
Fighter: Charges.
Dragon: AoO, Full Attack. Dead Fighter.
Cleric: "I'll totally heal him guys. Totally. because you know, that's a smart option when it takes 1 round for him to die."
Dragon: Breathes more fire, or Flyby Attacks the Cleric on his way to parking himself adjacent to the Wizard.

There's a reason Dragons are considered under CRed when compared to naive "I'm not going to optimize because that ruins the game" ideas of characters. It's because they annihilate parties of that level if they aren't intelligently optimized.

This is ignoring all the other things that Dragons can do, you know, like fly and cast spells.

[its_all_ogre]

yeah a CR20 dragon has far better things to do than full attack one single PC

if it decided to do that, without any combat boosting spells at all for some really strange reason, it can still use power attack and demolish any meatshield who is not seriously optimised.
even then one not protected by displacement or similar will likely die.

however dragons with no combat spells should be rare indeed, wraithstrike with full power attack will kill anything not immune to a dragons full attack, bar tarrasque and similar.
and thats not even an evilly optimised dragon.

[Frosty]

Are you sure a properly CR'ed dragon should be killing a fighter with one breath and a full-attack? Sounds like a mighty low-AC fighter to me.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Look at their AB.

Yeah, unless we're talking about a SRSLY! Cheesed out monk or swordsage, the dragon hits. Plenty.

[Frosty]

Maybe my PCs are over-wealthed, but I pit an above-average (in terms of special abilities and stats) Adult White Dragon vs 4 level 9s, and the Dragon Shaman tanked multiple Full-round attacks. Granted, this was a STUPID dragon in an environment that didn't let it use its flying tactics, but still. The dragon was hitting on a 6 or better, so 4 out of 5 attacks were hitting on average, but the damage just wasn't that good against the level 9 DS with like 120 HP. Maybe the dragon should've power attacked more.

[Yakk]

Does your math take into account the iterative strike penalties? That last hit at -15 probably isn't going to hit the dragon at all, and the third hit is going ot miss most of the time.

I presumed a +15 BaB, +10 stat bonus to hit (30 strength), and +5 magic weapon. No other bonuses. And got a 60% chance to hit.

This generated ~2.4 hits per full attack.

In reality, the fighter has +5 extra BaB and probably another +2 to +5 other situational bonuses.

Doing a deeper analysis with another +5 to BaB and +5 other situational (haste, bless, flanking, focus, etc), the level 20 fighter actually has a 95%/95%/85%/60% chance to hit, for an average of 3.35 hits per full attack.

So I was being conservative.


And hell, you want to stand in front of the dragon and trade attacks with it? Are you insane? That dragon, even if it doesn't use any of its smart tactics, should rip apart most characters in direct melee.

The Dragon has +46 to hit and a +12 strength damage bonus. 109 naive damage on an all-hit per round.

The level 20 fighter has a +7 shield bonus, +5 deflection, +13 armor bonus, +3 dex bonus, and +5 other bonuses to AC, for a 43 AC.

The level 20 fighter with 24 con has ~264 HP.

So... the dragon, even using a naive power attack, concentrated completely on a Fighter, doesn't kill the fighter in a single round.


As for casters, they're not supposed to use spells that allow saves. They'll probably want to take advantage of the low touch AC, however, and throw Orb spells, which don't allow saves for the damage, and bypass SR. At level 20, 10 of those orbs (if not metamagicked) will do the trick.

Yes, I'm well aware that the game has added spells that are touch-attack, no-SR, metamagic-cheese fodder. They are also a balance problems -- some of which is taken up with the dragon-cheese of "my scales bounce magic, my touch AC is now boosted! Bwahahaha!" (2nd or 3rd level spell that lets a dragon use their natural armor against touch attacks)

I also didn't use "assay spell resistance", or any cheese to get the saves up insanely, or "no save and die anyhow" spells. Nor did I find the "Reflex save or die/suck" spells that exist. Nor did I have the dragon set up antimagic fields and force everyone to punch through the 20/magic DR.

I just used naive tactics and naive builds for both sides.

And guess what? The dragon doesn't one-round the fighter. The fighter doesn't one-round the dragon. Healing the fighter is an effective strategy! (A single cast of "heal" probably brings the fighter back up to full HP). The wizard doesn't use an "I win" button, but the party of 4 level 20 characters can still beat the naively played dragon.

When a tactic or option becomes massively better than a naive build, there is a problem, because it quickly becomes an arms race.

...

Setting the balance point at "I win" wizards reduces the game to "who goes first", because that is who wins when two wizards fight. And it renders huge swaths of character concepts (a wizard who blasts things? a cleric who heals?) utterly useless compared to the "I win" button builds.

[Jasdoif]

Nor did I have the dragon set up antimagic fields and force everyone to punch through the 20/magic DR.Just to point out, DR/magic is also negated inside an AMF.

[Myatar_Panwar]

While I agree that the Errata is not as it should be for leap attack, why completely revise it when you could just use the original version of leap attack, from CAdv? Going from 2x to 3x is alright.

[Frosty]

And you've blown *how much* of your wealth on AC at that point? Do all Fighters get that? A +5 Animated shield, a +5 Mithril Full Plate, a +5 Ring of Protection, and maybe +5 Amulet of Natural Armor. Those are humongous chunks of your money, and that's if you're not putting other enchantments on there.

If you've got that much AC, the Dragon will just breathe on you and do other stuff to you instead, like maybe land on top of you. I do agree that the Dragon should not one-round a Fighter. It'd be stupid if they did. With power attack and casting Wraithstrike, 2-rounding the Fighter is reasonable.

[Cuddly]

And you've blown *how much* of your wealth on AC at that point? Do all Fighters get that? A +5 Animated shield, a +5 Mithril Full Plate, a +5 Ring of Protection, and maybe +5 Amulet of Natural Armor. Those are humongous chunks of your money, and that's if you're not putting other enchantments on there.

If you've got that much AC, the Dragon will just breathe on you and do other stuff to you instead, like maybe land on top of you. I do agree that the Dragon should not one-round a Fighter. It'd be stupid if they did. With power attack and casting Wraithstrike, 2-rounding the Fighter is reasonable.

What else is the fighter going to spend his cash on?
Besides, he just buys pearls of power and gets the +5 animated shield for the low, low cost of 18k, as opposed to 49k. Presumably the cleric is preparing a magic vestments spell for himself; there's no real reason why he shouldn't also cast it on the fighter if the fighter is providing the spell slots.

Getting +1 spikes of defending and casting Greater Magic Weapon on them costs 20k, 30 k less than taking up your neck slot with useless natural armor, and the armor bonus counts towards touch attacks.

Besides all this, if a fighter is to go out dragon hunting, one presumes he, the party tank, is investing in gear that helps against such a beast!

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

So we have a Fighter with:

+5 Sword of 5d6 other enhancments: 200000gp
+5 Animated Shield 49,000gp
+5 Ring of Protection 50,000gp
+5 Amulet of Natural Armor (and Con?) 50,000gp
+5 Full plate with probably some other effects we won't count: 30000gp
+6 to Str/Dex/Con 108,000gp
+1 Str Minimum from Tomb assuming all points in Str 27,500gp
+2 Tomb for Con. 55,000gp

That's 567,000gp on that crap alone (617,000 if +10 armor, 575 if you have Natural Armor and Con.), so you sure aren't going to have much else, like I don't know, those boots of flying would be a good start, though only the very beginning of essentials for even the most naive fighter.

You have a 43 AC, and the Dragon has 6th level spells.

So let's do it this way:

Round 1: Breath weapon from the dragon standing on the ground (to be nice to you) 22d4 breath weapon for average of 55 damage.
Charge and do: 48 damage. After a AoO that does damage, we'll get to that.
Full Attack:

Now, Dragons do this a lot of ways, let's start with Wraithstrike just so can we can see exactly how bad this is and take it off the table, this is just this one spell and nothing else:

+12 to hit Power attacking for 30, will probably hit on every attack.

Bite +12 4d6+42 (56)
Claw +10 2d8+37 (46)
Claw +10 2d8+37 (46)
Wing +10 2d6+37 (44)
Wing +10 2d6+37 (44)
Tail Slap +10 2d8+(51 or 81) (60 or 90)

So that's an average of 385 damage on a Breath + AoO (Power Attacking for 6 because I wanted a round number of Damage) + Wraithstrike Full Attack.

I'm pretty sure that kills the 264 HP fighter.

No let's play most retarded Dragon ever.

He's not going to use any sensible attempt at calculating Power Attack (Even though he has a higher BAB and Int and Wis then the fighter, so he's get three reasons to do the best Power Attack math in the world.) he's going to Power Attack so he hits on a 2. And he doesn't even know that he has spellcasting as a level 13 Sorcerer, and I don't even know where all his feats went, you'd think he spend at least one of them on something other then Power Attack/Cleave/Great Cleave, but apparently not.

Breath weapon stays the same 55 damage. AoO becomes Power Attack for 1 against your 43 AC fighter.

Full attack is Power Attacking for 0.

+42/+40/+40/+40/+40/+40

Damage: 55 breath, 29 AoO, +28+16+16+14+14+21=193 damage before you get to full attack him. Congratulations, the retarded Dragon does do small enough damage that you could be healed in one round. Of course, a fourth of that was AoE damage to the party.

Now let's play with a Dragon just as smart as the actual party. He took Power Attack, set some feats on fire for Cleave/Great Cleave, then went ahead and grabbed Improved Natural Attack for every single one of his weapon types. Then Weapon Focus for the same. Also Multiattack. I'm trying to choose as basic "duh!" feats possible here to avoid complete destruction. But he is going to take one Metabreath feat.

Then he cast some spells. (Oh my) like Haste, Greater Heroism, Bulls Strength, Mage Armor and Shield. (Totally within reason, in fact I'm being nice here.)

Oh also, he grabbed a metabreath feat which could be something like: Maximize or Clinging Breath. Maximize does less damage and reduces my math, so go with that.

He'll still be using the Stupid Power Attack method. And he's still not even using any of the Wealth he has (Like that +2 Tomb of Str you'll find in the back there. Yeah the one the Dragon was saving just for you.)

Now he has an AC 10 points higher for what that's actually worth, and it goes like this:

To Hit: +51

88 Damage for breath.
AoO does 5d6+33 (50.5)
Full Attack:
+43 Bite 5d6+31 (48.5)
+43 Bite 5d6+31 (48.5)
+41 Claw 3d8+20 (33.5)
+41 Claw 3d8+20 (33.5)
+41 Wing 3d6+20 (30.5)
+41 Wing 3d6+20 (30.5)
+41 Tail 3d8+36 (49.5)

Which all together works out to 413 damage before you can full attack.

Yeah, have fun with that.


Setting the balance point at "I win" wizards reduces the game to "who goes first", because that is who wins when two wizards fight. And it renders huge swaths of character concepts (a wizard who blasts things? a cleric who heals?) utterly useless compared to the "I win" button builds.

So I take it you've never actually played at that level of optimization, or you'd know better.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

What else is the fighter going to spend his cash on?
Besides, he just buys pearls of power and gets the +5 animated shield for the low, low cost of 18k, as opposed to 49k. Presumably the cleric is preparing a magic vestments spell for himself; there's no real reason why he shouldn't also cast it on the fighter if the fighter is providing the spell slots.

Getting +1 spikes of defending and casting Greater Magic Weapon on them costs 20k, 30 k less than taking up your neck slot with useless natural armor, and the armor bonus counts towards touch attacks.

Besides all this, if a fighter is to go out dragon hunting, one presumes he, the party tank, is investing in gear that helps against such a beast!

There are a lot of ways to optimize things like that. But you forgot that the whole premise is that the game is better when you put up a giant sign saying "No Optimization allowed. And don't make smart choices about your spells or actions either."

[Admiral Squish]

Look, Vecna, you raise a lot of solid points, but the simple truth of the matter is a relatively small percentage of the people discussing things on this forum play at the kind of power-level you describe. The majority of us cannot use the advice you give, simply because you play at an entirely different level. Might be a good thing, might be a bad thing, I don't know. But what I do know, is you cannot go around assuming we all play at your level, because it's simply not true. If you have something that could aid everyone, not just the people who play your level, then please contribute. However, at the moment, you're still discussing your 'plane of game' to coin a phrase. Please try to consider styles of play that aren't your own before joining a conversation. Thank you.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Look, Vecna, you raise a lot of solid points, but the simple truth of the matter is a relatively small percentage of the people discussing things on this forum play at the kind of power-level you describe. The majority of us cannot use the advice you give, simply because you play at an entirely different level. Might be a good thing, might be a bad thing, I don't know. But what I do know, is you cannot go around assuming we all play at your level, because it's simply not true. If you have something that could aid everyone, not just the people who play your level, then please contribute. However, at the moment, you're still discussing your 'plane of game' to coin a phrase. Please try to consider styles of play that aren't your own before joining a conversation. Thank you.

See now this is precisely my point:

1) I suggested that another poster should limit themselves to providing advice only if it helps a larger group of the forum then the small minority I see that actually play where Leap Attack is a problem.

Solution: Tell me how terrible I am for providing advice that doesn't fit anyone.

I'm serious, you just parroted my same complaint to Kizara back at me. I haven't been giving advice, just asking Kizara to stop proposing "solutions" to problems that most people don't have. (And then defending myself, excessively. Because that's what I do. And then demonstrating optimization patterns at different levels and number crunching. Because that's the other thing I do, and it's way more fun.)

2) None of those Dragons are even close to my "plane of game" one of them uses a single cheesy spell that I usually wouldn't use because it's so one dimensional, but way too freaking good at that one dimension.

One of them is so retarded that no DM in the universe could possibly ever play a Dragon that dumb without feeling horrible (I'm serious, the list of things being ignored is, oh right everything. That thing doesn't even have feats. Like any.)

And one of them is few buff spells up, but nothing serious. And still using the really dumb tactics of stand on the ground and let things hit me. But it's at about the level of optimization as the PCs Yakk suggested. Which of course means that it kills them all. This is what Under CRed means. It means that Dragons are too freaking strong to be facing almost any party of the same level of optimization and CR.

Seriously, optimizing a Dragon to the same level as a party always means the Dragon wins. If you have an "I win" Wizard then your dragon should have Epic Spellcasting and then it's just over. Or he can have a CL of 34. While he runs over the party with his Spell Resistance of 36ish or more.

Cause Dragons are freaking crazy.

[Admiral Squish]

What I'm saying is that you're not considering the percentage of us who DO have a problem with leap attack. And I assure you, it's a significant one. The truth of the matter is, you perceive your side as the majority, and I see my side as the majority, and thus we both think our side should be addressed first, or used as the standard. Maybe we're both wrong, and it's a strict 50/50. Point is, you're arguing from your side of the field, and only considering my side of the field by dramatically underestimating the capabilities of our side, in a manner that is, frankly, unnecessarily abrasive at times.

[Kizara]

See now this is precisely my point:
I'm serious, you just parroted my same complaint to Kizara back at me. I haven't been giving advice, just asking Kizara to stop proposing "solutions" to problems that most people don't have.


I believe that is actually his point. From his perspective, your position is the minority. From yours, his is. Honestly, I don't believe it matters. I feel its extremely rude to come into a thread and essentially intentionally try to troll/derail it by saying you shouldn't be "proposing 'solutions' to problems that most people don't have".

As my opening statement, I explained how my thread was aimed at people that saw the current melee metagame and Leap Attack's contribution to that as a problem. Obviously, you don't, so why come in here and attack me and then fight with people that try to defend me and/or use this thread constructively? Seriously, think about it.

I'm not even saying your wrong, just that forcing your 'way of playing' on others in the fashion you have in this thread, and trying to completely sabatodge it and my intiative is rude, non-constructive and bordering on some forum rules.

I'm honestly sorry for the hostility in the above, I actually have alot of respect for you as a poster and many of the opinions and contributions you have made in these forums, and indeed in some of the posts in this thread.

For the record, I believe as you do in that people should be making optimized choices, using the best tactical actions and in general should be smart, heroic and powerful. The main difference is that I also believe in setting the 'bar' at a reasonable level, limiting the competitive metagame and balancing availible choices.

Really, our ideology isn't far different, and I believe that if we were at the same table we would enjoy each-other's company, and find it extremely unfortunate that we are at odds in this case.

[Yakk]

Wraithstrike

Congrats! You just picked a spell that breaks D&D. Heck: the dragon might as well have UMD'd a charged device of time stop.

I'm well aware that the game is broken, that fights devolves to "he who hits first, wins". Pointing out that you can use the same kind of tactics on an NPC to have it win on the first hit isn't useful information.

Secondly, your character's intelligence has nothing to do with calculating the ideal power attack mathematics...


Now let's play with a Dragon just as smart as the actual party. He took Power Attack, set some feats on fire for Cleave/Great Cleave, then went ahead and grabbed Improved Natural Attack for every single one of his weapon types. Then Weapon Focus for the same. Also Multiattack. I'm trying to choose as basic "duh!" feats possible here to avoid complete destruction. But he is going to take one Metabreath feat.

*nod*, standard power creap feats, added to make up for "PCs using a good choice of feats can one-hit kill an even-CR target".


He'll still be using the Stupid Power Attack method. And he's still not even using any of the Wealth he has (Like that +2 Tomb of Str you'll find in the back there. Yeah the one the Dragon was saving just for you.)

A dragon that burns it's wealth isn't the same CR as a dragon who has that wealth as treasure.


So I take it you've never actually played at that level of optimization, or you'd know better.

What, I've never played an "I win" build? Yes, I have played an "I win" build. It wasn't that interesting.

So you fix the god damn game to remove the "I win" buttons. An even-CR monster shouldn't kill a fighter in a single round. If the even-CR monster is killing the fighter in a single round, either:
A> You need to beef up the fighter's defenses, or
B> You need to tone down the damage dealing of the monster

The fix isn't "let the fighter kill the monster in a single round", or "the fighter is such a little threat that the dragon, capable of killing t he fighter in a single round, ignores the fighter and kills the dangerous target".

Balance between PC classes isn't only component of Balance. There is offense vs defence balance, and intra-archtype balance, and inter-archtype balance all to consider.

[Frosty]

And it'd be great if DnD 3.5 had this balance. But...it doesn't, and it would take a massive overhaul to even begin to fix this. Let WoTC do that overhaul and call it DnD ver.4

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Congrats! You just picked a spell that breaks D&D. Heck: the dragon might as well have UMD'd a charged device of time stop.

That's what I said. I was just showing frosty the Wraithstrike is a one round kill. I specifically said that Wraithstrike is too powerful and one dimensional for me to use it on Dragons in my game. (Also for the Wraithstrike Dragon I calculate his to hit wrong, it should have been +18 not +12.)


I'm well aware that the game is broken, that fights devolves to "he who hits first, wins". Pointing out that you can use the same kind of tactics on an NPC to have it win on the first hit isn't useful information.

No they don't! Fights don't come down to who goes first, they come down to who plays smarter. That's why I like high powered D&D. You want to not die in one round against the Dragon? DON"T TRADE FULL ATTACKS! A Rangerd based Fighter, a Fighter with the same reach as the Dragon's bite (not that hard) and Stand Still, or any Fighter that moves away instead of standing there for a full attack would be able to do just fine.


Secondly, your character's intelligence has nothing to do with calculating the ideal power attack mathematics...

UM? Why doesn't it? Some DMs like to say that certain levels of intelligent play require either: being good with weapons (BAB) being smart (Int) being Wise (Wis). My point was the Dragon is better then the fighter in all three categories, so if the DM proposes some sort of limiting factor on Intelligent Power Attacking, the Dragon would still have every reason to Power Attack as intelligently as possible.


*nod*, standard power creap feats, added to make up for "PCs using a good choice of feats can one-hit kill an even-CR target".

No, not standard power creep. Core/Core/Core/Core/more Core, and one other feat that wasn't even needed since the Dragon did more damage on his full attack then the fighter had HP. How can you call using 11 of 12 feats on Core feats "Power Creep" especially when other options for the Dragon include:

Dire Charge (Pounce)
Epic Toughness (+50 HP)
Awaken Spell Resistance (Raise SR to 36)
Admixture Breath (Two energy types, double damage)
Epic Spellcasting

Seriously, taking away the damn metabreath feat and using nothing but Power Attack/Cleave/Weapon Focus/Improved Natural Attack, he still kills the fighter in a single full attack action.


A dragon that burns it's wealth isn't the same CR as a dragon who has that wealth as treasure.

I'm not advocating the Dragon expend the Tome. I am advocating that any type of realistic Dragon (IE one the DM won't punch himself in the face for running) would have used some of his Wealth, like on a +6 Str item that would allow him to more fully destroy you. (By which I mean on fewer attacks, because it only takes one round.)


What, I've never played an "I win" build? Yes, I have played an "I win" build. It wasn't that interesting.

No, you've never played high power D&D, because if you had you would know there is no such thing as an I win build. You only think that because you played against low power opponents.


So you fix the god damn game to remove the "I win" buttons. An even-CR monster shouldn't kill a fighter in a single round. If the even-CR monster is killing the fighter in a single round, either:
A> You need to beef up the fighter's defenses, or
B> You need to tone down the damage dealing of the monster

No you don't. You need to be smart enough to not let the Dragon Full Attack you. Because walking into a full attack (IE trying to set up your own full attack) is going to get you killed. You don't need to remove any I win buttons, because there aren't any. You need to face Monsters of the same power level as you, that are smart (which you would hopefully be as well) in which case, they would actually present a challenge.


The fix isn't "let the fighter kill the monster in a single round", or "the fighter is such a little threat that the dragon, capable of killing t he fighter in a single round, ignores the fighter and kills the dangerous target".

No, the fix is, make it so that if the Dragon is stupid the Fighter can kill him in one round, because the Dragon can already kill the Fighter in one round. Then you just have to have neither party be stupid.

[Frosty]

No, you've never played high power D&D, because if you had you would know there is no such thing as an I win build. You only think that because you played against low power opponents.

I dunno, I think Cindy would pretty much be a win build. I mean, do any DMs actually throw optimized Incantators at PCs in real campaigns? I mean sure nothing is 100%, but an optimized Incantatrix should single-handedly destroy the vast majority of parties out there if the party doesn't have a batman of their own. There is just too much of a gap between the classes and builds that there are effectively win buttons.

[Kizara]

For the record, what actually prompted me to change Leap Attack was that I kept giving it to my dragons and watching them roll over my PCs (along with shock trooper and combat brute). Dragons have ALOT of BAB to power attack with.


So saying that melee types need it to kill baddies like dragons is a bit ironic for me. :)


Oh, also for the record I have run a barb 1/ftr 2/hex 3/FB X leap attacker, and found it a great deal of fun. He also had a cleric of Erythnull as a cohort/groupie, and she took care of things like healing (double efficiency with frenzy subdual damage) and buffs like bull's strength, grillon's blessing and freedom of movement. I hardly believe that character should be the 'standard' for melee power, and find it amusing that people can optimize quite a bit further then that even.

[Frosty]

What you have to consider is that giving Dragons optimal feats such as Leap Attack should, imo, up the CR. The default CRs are for unoptimized Dragons. If you want your dragon to have Leap Attack, its CR should go up, so it would be faced by a higher level party. To be honest, I try to tailor the encounters to the abilities of my players. I usually homebrew my dragons to have a lot more HP than usual, for example, because my PCs are very, very powerful stats-wise. 40 pt-buy, an extra feat, and 1.5 times normal WBL will do that to ya.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

I dunno, I think Cindy would pretty much be a win build. I mean, do any DMs actually throw optimized Incantators at PCs in real campaigns? I mean sure nothing is 100%, but an optimized Incantatrix should single-handedly destroy the vast majority of parties out there if the party doesn't have a batman of their own. There is just too much of a gap between the classes and builds that there are effectively win buttons.

Cindy is likely to beat most anything. She's also not an instant I win button. Read Yakks comments, he believes that you can build something that wins on the first turn effortlessly.

That doesn't happen.

Cindy is "Challenged" by CR appropriate Monsters and NPCs that are optimized in the sense that they expend her resources. And if she's in a party, the party is at risk of dying several times over before Cindy can kill many types of enemies unless they are optimized and smart as well.

At high level D&D, protections are expected, used, and important. To make claims that it all comes down to who goes first is just silly, and demonstrates that he's never seen a high level Wizard/Druid/Cleric fight, much less participate in a campaign played with those characters in a party.

[Frosty]

Well depending on what she fights, she probably *can* kill one bad-ass creature on the first turn, if the bad-ass creature is the only enemy. And even if there are many enemies, you can Chain your metamagic'ed enervations to drain like 20 levels from all enemies (or does Chain reduce the enervations to draining only half that?).

Unless the enemies know before with divination (which is protected against by MindBlank) and have protections against Orbs and negative energy, Cindy may be able to just kill everything in a 30ft area. And she can do this multiple times per day. And if she detects Deathward (Persisted Greater Arcane Sight for example), she can do a Chained, Quickened Targeted Greater Dispel Magic first.

To challenge her, you gotta build monsters and NPCs specifically against her, and have them something get thru mindblank and be prepared.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Well depending on what she fights, she probably *can* kill one bad-ass creature on the first turn, if the bad-ass creature is the only enemy. And even if there are many enemies, you can Chain your metamagic'ed enervations to drain like 20 levels from all enemies (or does Chain reduce the enervations to draining only half that?).

Cindy uses Orbs, which cannot be chained. She must be within close range. There are assorted ways to detect her, and to move out of her attack range before she can kill you, even if you aren't prepared for her specifically.

You can also have your own protections up, they do exist.

There are also several ways to negate whatever attack method is used that are more specific. And all it takes is one person reading her Arcane Thesis on spell X to know what spell it is. Some enemies are going to know in advance what spell to prepare for.


Unless the enemies know before with divination (which is protected against by MindBlank) and have protections against Orbs and negative energy, Cindy may be able to just kill everything in a 30ft area. And she can do this multiple times per day. And if she detects Deathward (Persisted Greater Arcane Sight for example), she can do a Chained, Quickened Targeted Greater Dispel Magic first.

Cindy can either do Orbs or Enervations, these are mutually exclusive options.

There are several ways to prevent the Orb kills. And Cindy faces the same problems that any other non-dedicated counterspeller build faces at high levels, anyone else is going to be certain that Cindy has a very slim chance of removing their buffs. And so even if she might get a couple of her buffs, she isn't going to get the one she needs by any stretch of the imagination.

She can break out Disjunction, but then she's using 9th level spells to set up the kills, and she loses a good portion of her loot.

And if we are talking about enervations. Undead don't care if you greater dispel them.


To challenge her, you gotta build monsters and NPCs specifically against her, and have them something get thru mindblank and be prepared.

No you don't, you just have to build Monsters and NPCs that are optimized to the same level. Yes she wins, but PCs are suppossed to win, and these monsters can still kill off half the other PCs while still protected against Cindy.

[Frosty]

And why cant you Chain orbs? I, and all the DMs I've talked to, has had no problems with allowed Orbs to be chained. And there's nothing preventing an Incantators from focusing on Orbs *and* Enervation. Sure your orbs won't be quite as uber, but it's possible to do both and still get a respectable mid-200s damage with your orbs and an average of 20+ levels drained with enervation and all that.

At high levels, your orb range is going to be what...25 + 18/2 *5 = 70 ft? That's a decent distance, and out of charge range against some melee monsters. Arcane Thesis also raises caster levels, and Archmage does as well, so you'll probably be pulling 85ft range by the end. You're also flying, Superior Invisibled, so the enemy will have a hard time spellcrafting you.

And are you certain that the DM will optimize every single enemy's buffs to have extremely high CL to prevent Dispel Magic from working? If so, why bother with having Dispel Magic and its cousins in the game at all?

[Reinboom]

Leap Attack Fix
A feat many of us don't like, simply due to the levels it bothers us at, despite what others may say.
Thank you for your efforts. I will still say you might want to consider the +4 to attack if you haven't already.

In other news, I would like to say, this thread brings an important thought to my mind. "Hey look! A plane!"

[Kizara]

Leap Attack Fix
A feat many of us don't like, simply due to the levels it bothers us at, despite what others may say.
Thank you for your efforts. I will still say you might want to consider the +4 to attack if you haven't already.

In other news, I would like to say, this thread brings an important thought to my mind. "Hey look! A plane!"

Your welcome, if you are interested in other efforts of mine (and there are alot) please PM me. And yes, I did make it +4 to hit, but otherwise it's as the OP.

[Frosty]

Instead of +4, why not have it scale with level or HD?

[Kizara]

Instead of +4, why not have it scale with level or HD?

1) Cause the attack bonus isn't the point of the feat, and it's already plenty good as it is.

2) Charging doesn't scale with level or HD

3) It wouldn't make any sense. Maybe having it scale with your Jump check result (as per the calvary charger tactical feat) would make sense, but would make the feat mechanically ackward again and once again it doesn't need the boost.

If you wanted to re-work Leap Attack entirely to just give a scaling attack bonus on a jumping charge, that would be doable, but I wanted to keep the feat granting additional damage.

[Frosty]

Ahh I see. Your fix gives damage bonus as well.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

And why cant you Chain orbs? I, and all the DMs I've talked to, has had no problems with allowed Orbs to be chained. And there's nothing preventing an Incantators from focusing on Orbs *and* Enervation. Sure your orbs won't be quite as uber, but it's possible to do both and still get a respectable mid-200s damage with your orbs and an average of 20+ levels drained with enervation and all that.

I'm sorry, I forgot, you can chain Orbs, it's just totally not worth your time because it does half damage on a failed save and 1/4th damage on a successful one. Basically making you cry tears of sadness at all the monsters that laugh it off.

And here's the thing, to get one trick (either Orbs or Enervation) to decent levels in 4th level slots, you have to Chaos Shuffle. So unless you are going to give up Persist and Extend, you aren't even going to get to 200 damage in a 4th level slot (or 20 negative levels). You can get maybe 200 damage in a 6th level slot, and 20 negative levels in an 8th level slot. But that's hardly worth it because your negative levels are easy to avoid, and your Orbs won't be the type that do 3/4ths damage on an immune creature. They'll be the type that do no damage. Feats are in limited supply, and different feats are needed for Enervation vs. Orb builds, not even counting the Arcane Thesises made separately.


At high levels, your orb range is going to be what...25 + 18/2 *5 = 70 ft? That's a decent distance, and out of charge range against some melee monsters. Arcane Thesis also raises caster levels, and Archmage does as well, so you'll probably be pulling 85ft range by the end. You're also flying, Superior Invisibled, so the enemy will have a hard time spellcrafting you.

Which is all fine and great except that your opponent can also be invisible and undetectable and capable of taking actions on your turn, or readying, or using rings of spellbattle, or, or, or.


And are you certain that the DM will optimize every single enemy's buffs to have extremely high CL to prevent Dispel Magic from working? If so, why bother with having Dispel Magic and its cousins in the game at all?

Well since "optimizing every single enemies buffs" consists of 8000gp at level 20 (apparently). Yeah I think that's likely.

The reason you bother with it is because you use it against crappy non-optimized enemies in the Monster Manual. You don't use it against intelligent opponents who have reached high level combat and survived it more then once.

[Kizara]

Ahh I see. Your fix gives damage bonus as well.

Yes, as stated in the OP, instead of the power attack ratio increase, the feat now grants a bonus to damage equal to your strength modifier.

I ran some numbers regarding that earlier in this thread.

[Frosty]

I'm sorry, I forgot, you can chain Orbs, it's just totally not worth your time because it does half damage on a failed save and 1/4th damage on a successful one. Basically making you cry tears of sadness at all the monsters that laugh it off.

And here's the thing, to get one trick (either Orbs or Enervation) to decent levels in 4th level slots, you have to Chaos Shuffle. So unless you are going to give up Persist and Extend, you aren't even going to get to 200 damage in a 4th level slot (or 20 negative levels). You can get maybe 200 damage in a 6th level slot, and 20 negative levels in an 8th level slot. But that's hardly worth it because your negative levels are easy to avoid, and your Orbs won't be the type that do 3/4ths damage on an immune creature. They'll be the type that do no damage. Feats are in limited supply, and different feats are needed for Enervation vs. Orb builds, not even counting the Arcane Thesises made separately.

Well I'm not quite Cindy, but I don't think I need to be because the DM isn't using very optimized opponents against yet (yet). I use higher level slots to reach 200+ damage, which is enough to kill things in one shot anyways. But then, our Dms also don't allow Arcane thesis to work on +0 metamagics, so negative adjustments don't fly. Iirc, I use my sixth level slots for level negative levels and 225 orb damage. And...that's ok. I only need like 5 orbs a day and 5 Enervations. I'm slaughtering or weakening a bunch of enemies with one spell slot, and there are these things called party members that can finish off the enemies for you.

I figure that if I can cake-walk through 4 non-optimal encounters a day, then even against tougher opponents, I can do fine with the help of my allies. And you're right, my orbs can't do anything to immunities. That is why I have metamagic rods and other items that let me switch to an opposing element. I will use Greater Arcane Sight first to determine what the enemy is immune to. If they are immune to all the elements, then this is obviously a special opponent that deserve special care and teamwork. I mean seriously, anything that can be immune to all elements and negative levels is probably NOT a mook. This is when we buff the fighter have it kill the enemy instead while I try to dispel whatever buffs and equipment it is.

Here's a fun thing to try: The caster level of his ITEMS probably aren't terribly high. Targeted GDM on him and chain it to every single piece of his equipment.




Well since "optimizing every single enemies buffs" consists of 8000gp at level 20 (apparently). Yeah I think that's likely.


So it's 20% harder to dispel. That's hardly "almost never."


You don't use it against intelligent opponents who have reached high level combat and survived it more then once.

When we encounter those, we call them BBEGs or recurring villains. Against them, the party will take special care. Regular everyday combats should not be aganst Incantators with rings of enduring arcana. At least, that is my opinion. Properly optimized, or even only half-optimized (like mine) Incantators should slaughter normal battles that non-fullcasters would be somewhat cautious with.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

Well I'm not quite Cindy, but I don't think I need to be because the DM isn't using very optimized opponents against yet (yet). I use higher level slots to reach 200+ damage, which is enough to kill things in one shot anyways. But then, our Dms also don't allow Arcane thesis to work on +0 metamagics, so negative adjustments don't fly. Iirc, I use my sixth level slots for level negative levels and 225 orb damage. And...that's ok. I only need like 5 orbs a day and 5 Enervations. I'm slaughtering or weakening a bunch of enemies with one spell slot, and there are these things called party members that can finish off the enemies for you.

I figure that if I can cake-walk through 4 non-optimal encounters a day, then even against tougher opponents, I can do fine with the help of my allies. And you're right, my orbs can't do anything to immunities. That is why I have metamagic rods and other items that let me switch to an opposing element. I will use Greater Arcane Sight first to determine what the enemy is immune to. If they are immune to all the elements, then this is obviously a special opponent that deserve special care and teamwork. I mean seriously, anything that can be immune to all elements and negative levels is probably NOT a mook. This is when we buff the fighter have it kill the enemy instead while I try to dispel whatever buffs and equipment it is.

I don't even know what you are trying to say. I already said that anyone at all can walk through mooks. The point is that if you have Cindy in your party, you shouldn't be sending them against retard mooks.

Pretty much none of your tactics are likely to make any optimized challenge easier the 20% of your party resources. Which is exactly what an encounter is supposed to do.

A higher CR encounter is going to be even harder, and probably expend about 50% of your resources. That's about right too.


Here's a fun thing to try: The caster level of his ITEMS probably aren't terribly high. Targeted GDM on him and chain it to every single piece of his equipment.

I am well aware of that, and it would be great if you could even hit them with a targeted dispel most of the time, but 90% of the time you can't, and the other 10% of the time you have better things to do. Not to mention that doesn't exactly reduce the power level of most optimized encounters by much. Yeah it works wonders against Fighter Mcgee, but you aren't facing him.



So it's 20% harder to dispel. That's hardly "almost never."

No it's 40% harder to dispel, 6000gp would be 20%. And added to the 50% you already had, 90% failure is hardly ever.


When we encounter those, we call them BBEGs or recurring villains. Against them, the party will take special care. Regular everyday combats should not be aganst Incantators with rings of enduring arcana. At least, that is my opinion. Properly optimized, or even only half-optimized (like mine) Incantators should slaughter normal battles that non-fullcasters would be somewhat cautious with.

So in other words you advocate having a Party of Cindy, Incantatar number 2, Planar Shepard, Archivist, ect. and sending only one intelligent enemy every few levels?

You seriously think only BBEGs are allowed to be smart? See, when I look at the stats in the MM, and discover that the creatures Int and Wis scores are both higher then the theoretical human maximum, I decide that probably whatever I can come up with, so can they.

[Frosty]

And what equipment is this 8000 gold cost?

I'm advocating that a party consisting of Cindy-lite, Fighter McLockdown, Ninja, and Radiant Servant of Pelor (has BoED vows, focused on healing) shouldn't be facing uber enemies every single fight. Maybe I'm just used to our DM running us through 7, 8 encounters per session before resting. If a battle takes 20% of my resources, I expect to be boned.

[AtomicKitKat]

2 words for people who whine about Leap Attack.

Low Ceiling.

Honestly...

[tyckspoon]

2 words for people who whine about Leap Attack.

Low Ceiling.

Honestly...

Only takes a 10-foot jump, which is 2.5 feet of vertical gain. Not all that hard to find in any space that will be comfortable for Medium creatures and will definitely be around where Large or bigger creatures live. If you're fighting smaller things, well, hopefully you don't need to Leap Attack them anyway.

[AtomicKitKat]

Only takes a 10-foot jump, which is 2.5 feet of vertical gain. Not all that hard to find in any space that will be comfortable for Medium creatures and will definitely be around where Large or bigger creatures live. If you're fighting smaller things, well, hopefully you don't need to Leap Attack them anyway.

Are you sure it's not that you need 10 feet of height clearance?

[Jasdoif]

Are you sure it's not that you need 10 feet of height clearance?Yes. The feat's text explicitly states "10 feet of horizontal distance".